


Tactile Revision

by ItsClydeBitches



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Claustrophobia, Deadly Sins Garak/Bashir Fest, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode Related, Gen, Idiot men attempt to communicate and do about as well as you'd expect, M/M, Pre-Slash, if wishes were horses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-29
Updated: 2019-05-29
Packaged: 2020-03-27 15:27:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19015681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ItsClydeBitches/pseuds/ItsClydeBitches
Summary: Garak was quite familiar with the human saying of being careful what one wished for, another quaint attempt at undermining Federation optimism. Although, thanks to a station-wide anomaly and a faulty turbolift, perhaps he'd be inclined to re-evaluate the proverb's accuracy...





	Tactile Revision

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Garashir Deadly Sins Fan Fest. Thanks so much to Aurora-Nova and Zaan-Zaan for pulling this together! I'm considering this is my first "real" fic for these complicated assholes, so apologies if things are a little rough around the edges <3

Alexandra Lang was wearing a sweater.

Cashmere. Lavender. A scoop neck that left space for the small Andorian stone her girlfriend had given her. She crossed between the Klingon restaurant and the entrance to the replimat, all loose limbs and easy gait like she hadn’t just insulted him horribly.

A muscle in Garak’s jaw tightened. Then he smiled.

That was _his_ sweater. Or rather, the sweater he had agreed to make. Ms. Lang had approached him two weeks ago, asking for a comfortable top to compliment her green eyes, something for off duty-wear. In an Earth textile, please, and price was no problem. She’d said as much with an ease that implied an actual acquaintance between them. Very much a, _I’m happy_ _to pay you_ feeling. _I may even leave a substantial tip_. Ms. Lang was an individual who preferred to judge people herself, never basing such perceptions on wide-spread bigotry or rumors. She was a lot like his dear Doctor that way and Garak had enjoyed her brief, professional company.

Ah. There it was! The crowd of the promenade parted for Garak, everyone keeping their distance out of instinct. Routine, even. There was a clear buffer on all sides now, a wealth of space between him and the rest of the station. This was his path and Garak had never needed the likes of Ms. Lang to try and smooth it. He had hoped, however, that nearly a year of polite interaction had garnered him a bit more respect at the very least.

Because it was disrespect, oh yes. Obtaining that sweater would have been no easy feat. Where in the world had she gotten that yarn, particularly when Garak had been told it would take another three days before a shipment docked here? Who did she know who practiced knitting, particularly with such skill? The sweater was clearly handmade, but it also fit Ms. Lang perfectly and Garak knew from awful experience that such an accomplishment was no easy feat. Or a quick one. That lovely little piece was made months ago, so what was Garak to believe except that Ms. Lang’s order was something akin to a joke? Yes, let’s string the simple tailor along. Hope of latinum was no mere thing to the non-Federation types, particularly when one had long been interested in purchasing materials for undershirts that actually kept Cardassians warm.

Garak shivered, allowing himself a deep, but quiet sigh. Jokes. It wasn’t the first and it would not be the last. Jokes were his life now. In all respects.

Not that Garak allowed any of these thoughts to cross his face. He walked with shoulders a little hunched, hands clasped politely across his stomach, that affable smile still set firmly in place. This disguise had never quite stuck. How could it when he was already the outsider, the enemy, the suspected spy? But guaranteed failure was no excuse for lack of effort. It was all a matter of professional pride.

So Garak remained approachable as the rest of the world passed him by, and if he caught a flash of lavender across the way? That was perfectly fine.

He entered the turbolift alone. The doors closed and his smile dropped.

In retrospect, Ms. Lang was not the only one who had behaved suspiciously this morning. The populace of their dear station appeared more… energized today. There was a buzz in the air, one Garak did not trust, not in the least because a rowdy station tended to lead to more injuries and intoxication. Which in turn meant more work for Bashir, increasing the likelihood that he would need to cancel their lunch.

That, simply put, was not a possibility that Garak was willing to entertain today. Not when he had inexplicably lost the one customer who did not flinch when he took her measurements. Garak had never considered himself terribly tactile, but years of exile had taken their toll. The wire was an invaluable tool, a marvel of his people’s advancements, but it could not provide him with something as simple as a touch; a rush of pleasure emanating from something other than his own, manipulated biology. Sometimes Garak feared what would become of his defenses were someone to offer him the briefest press of palm to palm.

It was a weakness, a threat, a sin even, and as such had to be carefully controlled. Garak had convinced himself that he would not accept any comfort—in the hilariously impossibly situation where any was offered to him. No. Anything he had must be stolen, which was where his beautiful Doctor came in. In two hours time Garak would sit across the table from him, so close that he’d be able to feel the heat pouring off from his arms. Knees almost touching. Heads bent close together in the parody of a lover's conversation. Yet with glances that, astoundingly, seemed to be filled with genuine affection. Garak hadn’t known the Doctor long, but he’d observed him enough to find that he couldn’t lie to save his own skin, let alone string-along someone else. Garak had approached the pretty thing with no expectations other than securing a liaison between himself and the Federation—and even that, as the humans said, had been a long shot.

The flirting was an impulsive act born of boredom and the enduring shock of exactly how beautiful Bashir was. Garak had always found himself attracted across species, but it was something else entirely to find an alien who so perfectly embodied the modern aesthetic of Cardassian attraction. A long and tapered neck. Lean, capable of quickness, but with clear musculature underneath. Perhaps the only thing Garak could gift to Gul Dukat (beyond a skillfully placed knife to the back, of course) was the compliment that he embodied the Cardassian ideal, in looks if nothing else. His own stocky figure and steadily growing belly had never been considered attractive, by him or any of his fellows. How quaint that he should worry about such things now, when the rewards of an alluring physique were quite lost to him.

Garak’s smile returned as the lift began to ascend. Yes, one more difference between him and the good Doctor. His life was pitiful and apparently Garak himself had become pitiful too, because he found that a part of him would happily spend the rest of his days cataloguing those disparities; admiring all the ways that he was not Bashir and Bashir was very much not him.

He could not yet regret that.

“How did you manage such a thing?” Garak murmured, mind always on at least three topics at once, one of which was still Ms. Lang. Perhaps he had judged the girl too harshly. An unexpected gift? It was always possible she’d described the garment to a well-meaning relative and found it in a shipment one morning with no expectation that it would be there. He may very well return to his shop and find Ms. Lang standing there, twisting her fingers in a blatant display of nerves, apologizing for cancelling her order. Garak would meet her eyes and smile again. Touch her arm, even. Just briefly! Another stolen bit of warmth as payment for his labor thus far and assure her that this was actually a stroke of good luck. That cashmere was perfect for the nonexistent order that had _just_ come in and really, his work couldn’t compare to a gift from a loved one. Whoever it was clearly cared for her.

Or perhaps she wanted another? Certainly Ms. Lang would not be the first customer who’d asked for a duplicate. Beloved pieces grew worn with age and though the sweater he’d spotted appeared brand new, that may have just been a trick of the light. Besides, dry cleaning was at a minimum and a mere Ensign couldn’t easily get planet-side for proper wardrobe care. She may very well want a replicate for additional wear. Garak had long tried to expand his shop into the space next door so that he might provide such services, though as of yet the Ferengi’s latinum gods had not been so kind to him.

Astounding. A human plaything and dreams of pressing women’s blouses. So this was life. Garak briefly shut his eyes.

And the lift jerked.

" _No_ —" escaped from him before he clamped his mouth shut. 

Because that had not been a hiccup of the sort Garrak had grown used to over the last couple of months. One couldn’t combine Cardassian and Federation tech as Mr. O’Brien did without a few unfortunate repercussions. No, rather it was a full stumble and a near fall, as if some giant of myth had grabbed hold and given him a good shake. Garak’s hands shot out, finding the wall on his left and hanging on. There was a shudder running through the whole system now, a truly horrendous vibration emanating from somewhere deep below and rising up through the soles of his shoes. The lift suddenly felt, sounded, even _smelled_ wrong, a faint burning that briefly had Garak gagging into the sleeve of his shirt. Senses heightened though caution (not fear, not panic, not anything he couldn’t handle—) Garak picked up on a strange whistle overlapping it all.

It took another twenty grueling seconds for Garak to realize the sound was his own breathing. Then the lift smoothed out.

There. He wasn’t trapped and he wasn’t falling… so why was he still making that abhorrent noise? Garak clenched his teeth even harder and made fists against the wall, maintaining both until the sound faded away. He had no gods to pray to and he did not believe in luck, but he nevertheless sent some jumbled, instinctive thought outward when the lift continued on its way without any further trouble.

A number of floors to go until he quarters. Garak considered forgetting the toolkit he’d gone to fetch and just getting off here, but suddenly messing with the controls seemed like a foolish action. He tried to uncurl his hands and found them uncooperative. Very well. It was only a few more—

The lift began to stop on its own. Smoothly and, blessedly, the doors opened. The movement seemed slow though and by the time there was space enough for a Cardassian to slip through Garak had drawn blood into his palms.

“Garak!”

The grooves grew deeper.

“Doctor. A pleasure to see you as always, though I wish I had more time to spare. You’ll have to excuse me—”

“You’re busy? It’s slow going today and Jabara is holding down the fort. I just stopped by my rooms to change. I was actually heading your way.” Instead of stepping aside Bashir crowded into the lift with him, forcing Garak backwards in the process. He wore loose slacks and the green top Garak had made him two months ago. It was the perfect distraction. “I had hoped we could start our lunch early, but if you’re too busy…?”

Timing. It rarely worked in Garak’s favor. He had just been thinking about how he’d like a bit more of the Doctor’s company today—some warmth, conversation, perhaps someone to commiserate with about his lost order—but now all he could think about was how Bashir was blocking his exit, freedom from a space that suddenly seemed too small. By the time Garak had torn his eyes away from the man and had maneuvered himself around him, the doors were once again closed.

Very well then. Hardly a problem. By the stars, he was a trained member of the Obsidian Order. The protégé of Enabran Tain himself! Exile had not managed to strip that from him and Garak would not allow four simple walls to do so now.

So he loosened the pull of his shoulders and mustered his most charming smile. “Too busy, my dear? For you? Never.”

They were moving again, but in short, stuttering jerks that suggested all was still not as it should be. Bashir’s expression morphed from glowing pleasure at his words to shock when he caught sight of the tiny stream of blood now curving down Garak’s wrist; then alarmed as the lift ground to a total halt.

He would not break. Not in front of this man. Garak bit the inside of his cheek to keep himself quiet and began a string of internal commentary that would make the most hardened of Kingons flinch. Bashir’s own voice was a soothing contrast.

“Hmm… well that's not good. Bashir to ops. Ops? Bashir to O’Brien? Bashir to _Odo_? Oh come on.”

Under other circumstances Garak would have favored the good Doctor with a chuckle at his petulant attitude, bopping his comm again and again as if that would actually make a difference. Such determined optimism was as enthralling as it was useless. Why shouldn’t the communications be out as well? If the universe did have a will then that didn’t include any love for Garak. Nor even tolerance, if he allowed himself the luxury of a bit of self-pity. From Ms. Lang’s little surprise, to a lost hour with Bashir, to this incompetent, intolerable, utterly primitive contraption that was getting _smaller_ _and smaller with every goddamn moment—_

Warmth.

It startled Garak, forcing air into his stagnant lungs. When had he stopped breathing? It hardly mattered, nothing else did except for the hot sensation now blooming at the top of his chest, spreading down his back and upwards too, all the way into the roots of his hair. A single breath turned into a gasp, the sound too loud in the small space. Small enough that he didn’t care about the noises once again emanating from somewhere deep in his throat, mouth open and trembling like a fish. A flash of green and the smell of Federation issued shampoo alerted Garak to Bashir’s close proximity. There was the ghost of a breath against his neck. _Oh_. 

He’d pulled Garak firm against his own chest, hands moving with the confidence of a surgeon as they massaged around his collarbone and ridges. Bashir coaxed him to keep breathing. Or perhaps breathe more slowly? Garak couldn’t tell. The voice in his ear had grown muddled, fading in and out until he could only pick out the emotions within it. Like reassurance. Calm authority. The small portion of him untouched by panic—yes, panic—listened intently for pity and, failing to find it, sank even further into the offered embrace. Garak kept one hand firmly on the lift’s wall to keep the wretched thing back. His other hand twisted viciously into Bashir’s shirt, overly rough with the fabric.

_I’ll have to make him another_ , Garak thought.

Yes. A gift when it was all said and done. He could salvage this. With jokes, perhaps. Or a carefully cultivated indifference to the whole thing. That might endear the Doctor to him further; let him project whatever emotions onto Garak that he wished. Yes, there were options and Garak would claim them just as soon as this failure of a contraption decided to _move_.

Of course, such an event would result in another release; from Bashir’s arms and whatever words were still being whispered in his ear. Something kind and warm, hot, sweltering as a Cardassian sauna and Garak wanted more time to translate it all. The push and pull between both desires was enough to draw out a laugh. It came out as a strangled whimper instead.

“I’ve got you,” he thought he heard but then Garak’s ears popped and the lift was moving again. The doors opened on his level and Garak propelled himself into open air.

Willing wrenching himself from Bashir’s arms.The irony was hardly lost on him. Hands on his knees Garak allowed himself three deep breaths, a self-indulgent number, but it wasn’t as if he could possibly make things worse. Indeed, playing up his vulnerability might serve him well later on. If nothing else Bashir was compassionate and such a display could earn him more stolen moments.

_Hardly stolen if they’re freely given_ , his mind countered, fitting itself back together with the long stretch of corridor on either side of him. _He held you. For medical purposes, certainly. And only for a few moments. And there_ was _pity somewhere in there, even if you failed to catch it. You know there was… but are you really in a position to reject any of it?_

No. He wasn’t. Garak would not soon forget that.

So he allowed his shirt to remain rumbled and kept his new smile a little uneven, gifts of a sort that he hoped would one day provide a return. Garak looked back to inquire in a deliberately offhand voice if Bashir would still like to start their lunch early…yet found the lift empty.

“Doctor?”

Bashir could not have slipped past him, even in his current state. He wouldn’t have left.

“ _Doctor?_ ”

Shirt smoothed back out; smile immaculate. Garak took the stairs back down to the promenade, ears open for his Doctor’s voice. Instead he found excited, incessant chatter about an anomaly at play; warnings to keep one’s thoughts in order until ops could deal with the phenomenon. Apparently, all sorts of wishes were coming true.

Numb, Garak watched a child summon some small mammal out of thin air, cuddling it to their chest. A man passing by had two outrageously beautiful women draped over his arms. They generated a small breeze passing him by and it chilled Garak’s chest, cold spreading outwards to kill off what was left of the heat. Odd, but it suddenly seemed harder to breathe than it had been in the lift.

_You sickening fool._

Garak crossed through the crowds—his path still laid out for him—and mechanically closed up his shop. He took the stairs all the way back to his quarters and as he did Garak employed the techniques shown to him by Tain as a young child, those that had always failed him in small, static places. However, with the stars visible through each porthole Garak kept any and all wishes at bay.

It was the work of a few minutes to hack the security feeds and see that Doctor Bashir had not left the infirmary since early that morning. He was swamped, treating both the injuries and panic that stemmed from a station that could suddenly have whatever it pleased.

When Ms. Lang approached him two days later, crestfallen and asking after her sweater, Garak made no comment about the little wish that he’d seen. At the very least, he now understood perfectly what she'd desired.

That made two of them.

***

The door chimed around 2300, the sound lacing through Garak’s head and settling just behind his eyes. The voice that came a moment later was just as painful, though for entirely different reasons.

“Garak? Garak! I know you’re in there.”

Damn the surveillance on this station. Garak had once thought Cardassian technology was superior in that regard, up until he first heard the Federation’s, “Computer, locate ___.” Even his people valued privacy enough not to hand total movement intelligence to any ranking member of their military. One more way, he was learning, in which the Federation’s relatively harmless veneer was just that: a well calculated façade.

Garak was not impressed. It was not that kind of night.

“ _Garak_. You’re not the type to sleep through a door chime. Or my deliberately LOUD greetings. I’m telling you right now that I’m not leaving, so either I risk waking your neighbors or you open the damn door.”

Fascinating. Garak had never heard the good Doctor curse before. It made him wonder what he’d have to do to pull more out of him; perhaps something with a bit more bite to it than Standard’s lackluster vocabulary. It likewise made him wonder what about the situation had finally pierced that steadfast professionalism. The late hour? An illusion of privacy—neighbors aside? Even, dare Garak think it, a certain level of comfort between them? There were few reasons why Bashir would be pounding on his door this time of night and the urge to read into a select few was irresistible.

Garak resisted anyway.

“You’ve been avoiding me.” The accusation was followed by a thump on the doorframe. “If I wasn’t sure before I am now. C’mon, Garak.” Whiny. Insistent. No argument attached to his claims and it all should have left a foul taste in the back of Garak’s mouth. Instead it watered, eager to hear more. “If I’ve done something to offend you then will you at least _tell_ me? Maybe…”

Bashir didn’t finish his hypothetical. He didn’t have to. Garak keyed the door open on that unspoken promise.

“Oh,” Bashir said.

“Indeed,” and Garak gestured him inside. For just a moment he could see himself in the hesitant curve of the Doctor’s body; hair slightly out of place. The glassy sheen to his eyes. Details that were easily dismissed by the unobservant, or familiar to the overly trusting. Neither man fit that description and Garak made no move to hide the half-empty bottle of Kanar on the table. He’d intended to gift Bashir with such vulnerability weeks ago. No reason why he couldn’t do so now.

Bashir eyed the bottle, then the rumpled crease in Garak’s shirt. He gave them both the same appraisal he would a medical exam that wasn’t turning out quite as expected. Good. Garak had bred enough suspicion in him that Bashir was inclined to interpret it all as another artfully constructed lie. It was, after all, customary in Cardassian culture for loved ones to earn their gifts.

His thoughts meandered. The silence stretched. Garak accepted his role as the drunken host so well that the plainness with which he wore the appearance appeared to be one more mask. Bashir straightened his shoulders with a furious huff.

“Really?” he said. “This is what you do instead of answering my messages?”

“My apologies. It’s quite the busy season, you understand. But you’re here now, Doctor. You are welcome to speak your mind... and I assumed you would, given your rather dramatic insistence on disturbing my night. Unless you’re content to continue staring at me for the rest of the evening?”

The part of his mind sloshing in Quark’s over-priced swill desperately hoped for the latter. Yes, he’d take a night of those eyes on him in a heartbeat, even when hey were filled with righteous judgement. The intensity of Bashir’s gaze was almost as good as his touch.

_You’ve never known his touch,_ Garak countered himself and rocked back on his heels, putting more distance between them.

It was for the best. Bashir turned that gaze away just as soon as it was noted. The room seemed colder now and Garak’s skin itched as Bashir ran long fingers over the back of a chair.

“You already know what I want to ask you,” he said, positively growling the words. “And you know I’m no good at thinking of a round-about way to do that. We _both_ know you wouldn’t give me an honest answer even if I could.” A wry smile graced his face, gone as quick as it had arrived. “You’re welcome to continue insulting me, you know. About how I’m too predictable and naive… I’d just prefer that you do it over lunch tomorrow.”

Garak briefly shut his eyes. To anyone else it was a blink, but that split second was enough to acknowledge that he’d put as much effort into his excuses that past two weeks as he had his persona of a plain and simple tailor. Which was to say, only enough for plausible deniability. There was a shipment coming in that he had to take stock of. Customer orders were eating up all of his time. Terribly sorry, Doctor, but I’m feeling a bit under the weather today—but no, there’s no need for your expert attentions. Each excuse held fine on its own but created an insultingly obvious pattern as the days went by. His desire for the Doctor’s presence had been overshadowed by a phantom, yet a small part of him had nevertheless wondered whether Bashir would fight for their friendship. It had been a small, fragile piece of him.

Now that the piece had been acknowledge, Garak didn’t know what to do with it.

Bashir was studying him again, a sweeping glance along chest and shoulders that reminded Garak too much of the imposter’s touch. He should speak. He’d been offered a gift in turn, hadn’t he? But with the memory came a surge of disgust that he’d been fooled in such a manner. How could Garak have ever confused the two? He should have realized at the first touch that he was only granting it to himself. He should have _known_ —

“The plasma field anomaly,” Bashir said, his tone, impossibly, even softer than his counterpart’s had been. “You first cancelled immediately after that nonsense. What did you see, Garak?”

“Really, Doctor. No, not subtle at all, are you?”

He sat. “Do I need to be?”

“The mere fact that you would ask that demonstrates how little you’ve managed to learn these last few months.”

“Then how about you continue to teach me?”

Garak inclined his head in acknowledgement of the second attempt. It seemed Bashir was determined to give him this; still willing to endure his company—sought it out, even!—despite these missing pieces. For now at least. Garak had deleted the lift’s security footage with a finesse that even Odo couldn’t trace. He certainly would not speak of the incident himself. Compartmentalization was a matter of course for Order members, but Bashir was a Federation man, expectant that others would eventually share all aspects of themselves. They may well be reaching the point when Garak's lies could no longer hold his interest.

Indeed, Bashir’s eyes were tracing him once more, insistently, though now they seemed fixed on the past rather than this messy present. His Doctor was far from stupid and Garak could see him weighing each factor involved here, discovering that subtly that he claimed still eluded him: the nature of the anomaly, what Garak might have imagined for himself, the division between them, and then, this night, where a stiff drink was leading them… Garak’s mind floated beneath a hazy fuzz that kept most of his anxiety at bay. He had long been prepared for this moment, when Bashir realized that creased shirts and ambiguous smiles were all he’d ever get.

He pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes. Bashir did, not Garak, for his own limbs were heavy as latinum.

“Okay,” Bashir muttered, face still covered and leg jiggling in a most distracting manner. “You’re not going to tell me. It’s clear you’re not going to let it go either. I don’t know why I’m surprised. I had fake Jadzia draping herself over me in front of the real Jadzia and yet somehow _you_ manage to be the most dramatic about all this.”

Pain laced through Garak’s chest at the admission. There was fondness too though and he snatched at it, insisting that it settle within him instead. For once words weren’t coming easily to him. Luckily, Bashir seemed to have enough for the both of them. Most that followed were soft and nearly unintelligible, clearly for his own release, but Garak soaked them up nonetheless. He’d learned these past weeks that he’d take anything the Doctor gave him—real or imagined—and it seemed his friend remained impossibly generous.

Bashir stood. He finally released Garak to instead stare at the isolinear rods stacked on his shelf. He homed in on one in particular and a small, true smile emerged. Garak felt the pain lessening at that alone.

“I’m half tempted to start a debate on Koroke. Seems a waste to pass up an opportunity when your faculties are impaired. Even if it's only a little.”

Garak chuckled. “How Cardassian of you.”

“But that’s not why I came here tonight, so suffice to say I think his writing is horrid, but you certainly have a thing for those repetitive epics, don’t you? The same story base told again and again, but with varying details. You can, apparently, always start over.”

A disgustingly simplistic reading. It cleared some of the kanar from his head. Garak opened his mouth to both counter and confess that, sadly, it seemed Bashir would not appreciate _The Never Ending Sacrifice_. An unavoidable chasm between their cultures then, symbolic of this whole embarrassing affair. 

Then Bashir circled him.

Only halfway, so that he paused behind Garak’s right shoulder, but the movement was predatory and it caused the scales on the back of Garak’s neck to lift ever so slightly, a defensive position from generations past. No blow came, however, unless one considered the verbal word to be a weapon.

Garak always had.

“It’s Garak, isn’t it? Of course it is. May I introduce myself?”

_Ah._ New beginnings. How utterly charming.

It was his turn, his line, and though Garak could have played the part of a blushing naïf he wasn’t particularly in the mood to. Bashir was so close now—as close as he’d once been—and it seemed both familiar and foreign, needed and threatening. Garak was inclined to join the game despite the danger, so he nodded in acquiesce. The expression that passed Bashir’s features was nothing short of staggering relief.

“My name is Doctor Bashir. A human by birth, obviously. There are many of us here, but I still appreciate making new friends whenever I can. You’ve been on this station a while, I believe?”

“Indeed, I have. Going on four years now. Forgive me, would you care for some of this kanar? It’s very good.”

“What a thoughtful Cardassian you are!” There was space between them, but it wasn’t distance now. “How nice that we’ve met.”

Sincere words? They certainly had been when Garak spoke them. They both sat this time and he steepled hands beneath his chin, the posture grounding.

“You know,” Garak said. “Some people say that I remained on Deep Space Nine as the eyes and ears of my fellow Cardassians…”

“You don’t say? Garak, you’re not intimating that you’re some sort of spy, are you?”

“I couldn’t say.”

“Of course not.” Bashir chuckled.

“It does beg the question though: should a man of your standing be associating with one such as me?”

A break from the script. There was silence in the room and when it broke the shattering was both soft and welcome.

“You have an open mind, Garak. The essence of intellect. I’d like to see more of that.” Bashir paused. “As you may know I’m the CMO of this station, so if you should require any assistance or merely wish, as I do, for a bit of enjoyable company now and then, I’m at your disposal.”

Garak ducked his head. It was a gesture that might, in the optimist, be interpreted as thanks. “You’re very kind, Doctor Bashir.”

“Oh, it’s just Julian. Plain, simple Julian.”

The revision. Small, but potent.

When Julian made for the door and his hands graced Garak’s shoulders it was a beginning, and an erasing, and everything they needed to move forward.

 

 ~Fin 

 


End file.
